BUTTER DEFECTS 479 



7. Deliver or ship the cream often. 



In the case of the cream station system of receiving cream, 

 cream that may have arrived at the cream station in good condi- 

 tion, frequently is yeasty and foams over by the time it reaches 

 the central creamery. In this case the yeasty defect is largely 

 due to faulty handling of the cream at the cream station. 



In order to avoid this the cream, after it has been trans- 

 ferred to the shipping cans, should be set in cold water or in 

 a cold room and held there until shipping time. 



If, during hot weather, cream arrives at the creamery at 

 a time too late for "dumping" on the same day, the cans should 

 be rolled into the cooler, in order to prevent the development 

 of foamy cream over night. 



Bitter Flavor. The bitter flavor of butter is a defect, which 

 is confined largely to dairy butter. Its occurrence in creamery 

 butter is comparatively rare. The bitter flavor is either present 

 in the milk at the time it is drawn or it develops in the milk or 

 cream after milking. In either case it passes also into the 

 butter. 



There are individual cows when in poor physical condition, 

 or when they have reached an advanced state of their period of 

 lactation, usually after the sixth month, that yield milk that has 

 a bitter taste. In many of these cases of bitter milk, the milk 

 is abnormal also in other respects. Often the milk is very 

 viscous and produces cream that refuses to churn out; the but- 

 ter usually has a poor texture and is greasy. In some instances 

 this bitter milk does not curdle in the natural way. The exact 

 cause of this condition has not been satisfactorily determined. 

 Weigmann 1 suggests the probability that the peptonizing of the 

 milk proteids may yield bitter-tasting albumoses and peptones, 

 but he also mentions the possibility of the presence in such milk 

 of special bitter substances. Whether these lower forms of 

 milk proteids, the albumoses and peptones, are the result of 

 abnormal physiological action of the cows and are therefore 

 inherent in such milk, or whether they are due to bacterial ac- 

 tion by udder microorganisms, is also a matter not experi- 

 mentally determined. According to Weigmann certain species 

 of the coli and aerogenes groups of bacteria, also Bacterium 



1 Weigmann My kologie der Milch, 1911, p. 132. 



